Les Deux Alpes Snow Report

The vast majority of French resorts saw their opening weekend on the 15th December, while those already open moved closer towards opening more of their terrain. This was coupled with moderate snowfall across many of these resorts.

The Paradiski region was operating 25 lifts serving 37 runs on Monday 17th, while the Portes Du Soleil region was similarly running approximately a quarter of their compliment. This is indicative of many resorts and connected regions, with the higher resorts and mountains offering promising skiing thanks to far more substantial quantities of snow recorded over the past few weeks. Despite supplemental artificial production however, there remains some work to do before runs sitting further down the mountain, as well as those away from major thoroughfares have adequate cover. Those resorts sitting at higher altitudes have been seeing consistent snowfall however, with as much as 20cm in Espace Killy, while the upper slopes above the Three Valleys saw almost that amount. These high alpine resorts are the outliers though, with only more moderate dustings in the majority of resorts. The coming week will deliver changeable conditions, with mild temperatures limiting the ability to generate large quantities of artificial snow, with the likelihood that many resorts will not be fully operational by Christmas.

Resorts including Argentiere (0/130cm) and Chamonix are forecast to receive some of the largest quantities of the snow expected in the coming days, though the area has yet to bring the majority of their terrain on line, in part due to challenging snow conditions. Wednesday could deliver 20-30cm of snowfall however, meaning Thursday could be a standout day to take advantage.